The Portege Z20t from Toshiba takes aim at the Surface Pro 3

Fanless. Light. Long battery life. These are all the things that laptop, Ultrabook and tablet users can look forward to in 2015. Much of this is due to Intel's new Core M and fifth generation Core i series of chips.

The Toshiba Portégé Z20t brings a tablet into a laptop form with the familiar 2-in-1 form factors that are becoming more commonplace these days. The device lets users operate the Portégé as a standalone tablet, full laptop, or a full-power tablet with the display rotated around and even features a pen.

The Toshiba Portégé Z20t is aimed at enterprise, businesses, educational institutions, and hospitals. The flexibility of the display, the long battery life, and the security features all ensure that institutions buying this in bulk will get a versatile device for varying conditions.

Because it uses a Core M, the Portégé Z20t is super fast but it does not need a fan to cool it down either, making it a sleek, durable device. The full Gigabit Ethernet port is a rarity these days and will certainly make those in business happy, and the two USB 3.0 ports makes sure that file transfers will be zippy.

Pricing for the Portégé Z20t should start at $1400, depending on configuration, and it will be available later this month in various markets.

What would really have been revolutionary for the 2-in-1 space would be if they had the Core-M chip in the tablet part, but then put a Broadwell Core i5/i7 chip (with fan for cooling) in the Keyboard section so that when docked with the keyboard, the device would switch to the more high performance CPU (maybe stick a discrete GPU in the keyboard section too).

This would then truly bridge the divide between thin & light tablet and high performance ultrabook, giving you the best of both worlds.

2 CPU's would probably make it expensive, but it would be one hell of a machine.

So it begins. The OEMs armed with the broadwell can now sell appealing tablets, convertablies and laptops that will expand the WinTel ecosystem. What are your thoughts about Windows 10 unifying the tablet, laptop, WP operating systems?

Not much, people still need to make the apps and they won't be 100% same for all platforms at once. Also people don't use apps a lot on PC/desktop.
So I see no reason for windows 10 to be an instant game changer, maybe with time and good marketing and wiling developers.

The Core M is ment to reduce energy demand. The Haswell (i# Core) is a 15 watt chip. The Broadwell (Core M) is a 4.5 watt chip. The perfromance is similar but at 1/3 the wattage. Intel does restrict the overclocking to protect the heat signiature that will damage the processor. By elliminating the fan you reduce thickness, weight and power demand. I don't think there are significant heat issues. I did notice a warm spot on the back of a Core M laptop while shopping at bestbuy in early December. Don't think heat will be an issue.

Yup you could, but its another thing to take with you. And what about the speed of the usb? Anyway sp3 might be easier to take with you around tje house, as a student its portability aint important to me.

Nah colleges last for 2 hours minimum so laptop will do fine and you carry it in your backpack anyway. I agree lightness is important, price is much more important since budget's aren't high in general.

The sp3 is a great machine though and as a small note taking took it is great, but 12inch is small when doing allot of work.

Than it is a good solution if the dongle come's with the device as a gift from the company haha. Thinner is better and lighter but wifi reach is not always great in buildings therefore i use fibreglass cables and connection.

@NM_N You are contradicting yourself - worrying about "another thing to take with you" but then saying "portabitily isn't important" so why worry about having an adapter in those incredibly rare times that WiFi isn't stable and ethernet is actually needed. It sounds like your WiFi router is the issue here, as WiFi is rock-solid everywhere I go. If you're messing around with fibre optic (not fibreglass, lol) then just get a little WiFi router to sit on the end of that connection. Then you'll have strong WiFi without having to sit at a fixed location.

No i meant multiple devices or tools to make it happen. In a laptop or tablet form factor, though i don't have a docking station I'm guessing it won't fit in my bag? A simple setup piece for Ethernet is do able though. Haha meant that not the fibreglass although in my native language its called that. Also 3 floors up from the router give's me a bad signal. But could be the router, however my gf has the same at her house so that's my reasoning. How stable is the usb btw? I like cable's because i play mmorpg's and the cable give's me a more stable connection

So we should include all the ports, like 4 USB, full HDMI, VGA, Ethernet, on our surface pro devices and have them look like crap? You can buy one of dozens of adapters that give you gigabit Ethernet. You're already carrying an Ethernet cable with you anyway. Don't you have pockets in your backpack? Besides, most places, especially universities don't have accessible Ethernet anyway. At a lot of universities plugging into the network is a security violation anyway. 98% of people who want a surface don't want a big ugly Ethernet port making their tablet thicker.

I'd agree.... but you can see where things are headed. It won't be long until we see tablet modules that are even lighter, with keyboard docks that can also be lighter and thinner. The Asus/Acer Chi line introduced at CES this week executes on this formula quite nicely. (Sorry I always get Asus and Acer mixed up)

Just wanted to note for other readers: SP3 also has the trusted platform module and with BitLocker support in 8.1 Pro, it also has good security options out of the box for most.
I had to Bing the Intel active management thing. That definitely is targeted towards enterprise customers, and is part of the out of band management features supported by the vPro flavor of Core CPUs.

But Toshiba will be able to deliver enterprise support on these devices. Same day replacement or repair for example. And spare parts for the coming 5 years or so. Worldwide support, etc. I am not sure if MS can deliver that on the SP3.